The Ironic Effect Depression Has On Managing The Emotions

Posted on July 3, 2015

People who are depressed often do little to improve their mood, even when given the chance, a new study finds. In fact, their choices often make them sadder, the research found.

Ms Yael Millgram, the study’s first author, said:
“Our findings show that, contrary to what we might expect, depressed people sometimes choose to behave in a manner that increases rather than decreases their sadness. This is important because it suggests that depressed individuals may sometimes be unsuccessful in decreasing their sadness in daily life because, in some sense, they hold on to it.”

Managing and controlling your emotions is an important part of everyday life. The researchers looked at the decisions both depressed and nondepressed people made in this regard.

In one trial people looked at happy, sad and neutral photos.Participants were then given the choice of which photos to look at again.
Ironically, depressed people were more likely to look at the sad photos again. In another trial, the researchers used happy, sad and neutral music.

Again, it was the sad music that was chosen by 62% of depressed people, as opposed to only 24% of nondepressed people.

Ms Millgram said: “Depressed participants indicated that they would feel less sad if they listened to happy music and more sad if they listened to sad music, but they picked the sad music to listen to. We were surprised that depressed participants made such choices although they were aware of how these types of music would make them feel.”

Why depressed people should chose to reinforce their depressed mood is not yet known.